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When something wonderful or awful happens the first thing that might pop into your head is, “I need to talk to someone about it,” and that someone is usually a trusted friend. Sure, some of us are more quiet and guarded about our thoughts than others but the need to share our personal experiences and feelings is woven into the fabric of our being. We are social creatures after all.
‘Sharing our feelings can helps us break down our thoughts
so we can understand what triggered the emotions and
what we should do to make things better.’
Why and how should you share your feelings?
1. It strengthens your close relationships. When you share your innermost thoughts and feelings with a friend, you are telling her that you trust her. It gives your friend the opportunity to support you - to be happy when you are happy and to help you when you are down. Metaphorically, you open the door to let them into your life, and improve your sense of wellbeing.
If you don’t let anyone in, how can they really know you and
if they don’t know you, how can they love and support you?
2. It helps you find solutions. Sometimes, just putting your feelings in words helps you unravel the mystery behind your emotions so that you understand yourself better. What you thought caused them vs what really caused them, what you can do to avoid feeling like that again. If it is a happy emotion then you would know what gives you joy, and what you should do to feel that way again. Your friend who is listening to you, can guide you towards the right answers. Sometimes, we are caught in a loop and our friends who know us well can help us get out of it and figure out what works for us and their feedback can contribute to personal growth.
It is okay to call a friend and say, “I need you to help me understand
what I am going through and what I can do about it.”
3. It is good for your health. Sharing is a way to release your emotions and is known to reduce symptoms of stress like digestive issues, headaches and muscle aches. We don’t need to read research papers to know that bottling up your emotions over a long period of time can lead to chronic health problems like heart disease and mental health issues like mood disorders.
We all know someone who would probably be in better health if
they would talk to someone about their feelings.
Yes, you probably know all this and are looking for an answer to the ‘HOW’ of it. The answer to this comes naturally to some people, and evades a lot of us. So, yeah sure sharing is good but with WHO and HOW?
Who should you open up with, and share your feelings?
Someone you know you can trust and who trusts you in return, who you can be emotionally naked and vulnerable with. It’s probably the people whose names come to your mind when you read this. The list of people in one’s ‘inner circle’ is usually small - comprising of friends and family who have over a period of time proven to us that they care for us, make an effort to understand us without judgment, are easy to talk to, and feel the same way about us i.e. they trust us with their personal thoughts too. Choosing whom to speak with is especially key when you are feeling low, you are much more sensitive to ambivalence or negative comments.
Ask yourself, “The last time I opened up to him, did he make me feel better or worse?”, and “Does she open up to me as well?”
Who you call from among those in your inner circle depends on the situation. You may be feeling low because of a heartbreak and while you are very close to your mom you feel that she won’t say the things you need to hear right now and will get angry and upset on your behalf. So, you decide to call your childhood friend who understands this side of your life, is going through the same phase in life, will hear you out without judgment and help you get back on your feet. Maybe he’ll drive down to where you are and accompany you to ‘dance it all away’ at your favourite club.
How should you share without feeling like you are over sharing?
While you share, listen and pay attention too. You don’t want to be that person who goes down a rabbit hole of related incidents for an hour, or vents endlessly without being open to solutions.
Look out for body language cues from your friend that she is interested throughout the conversation and is not drowning in all the emotional information you are sending her way. Every conversation, even when it is about you not feeling great, is a two way street. If you want to be heard, you have to listen as well.
Simply venting only for the sake of ‘letting it all out’ can help, but when done repeatedly it can be detrimental for you and for your relationship. Studies have shown that it can make you relive the negative feelings in your body, and strengthen the neural pathways for the emotion. The listener might ‘catch’ your mood as well, and feel frustrated if you are caught in a venting loop and aren’t inclined to learn from the experiences.
The right reason to share should not be to ‘unburden yourself onto someone else’
but to have a two way conversation to understand your feelings, to find solutions,
and to open up in a meaningful way with your close friends.
Use a mood sharing app like My Mood Circle to subtly let your close friends know how you are feeling. Mood sharing apps are a great way to log in your emotions to keep track of them yourselves and let your close friends know without having to talk at great length about it frequently.
So sharing feelings becomes a way of life, rather than needing to find a time and place to share, and thinking about how to frame the conversation.
The My Mood Circle app makes it even easier by letting you choose a colour that depicts your mood best, and displaying it against your profile for your close ones to see when they want to. It is possibly the easiest and least awkward way to share your emotions frequently.
Talk to a therapist. Sometimes, you might feel that you are caught in a ruminating cycle of negative thoughts and despite talking to friends about it you don’t seem to be feeling better. A professional can help you clear the cobwebs and work at your pace toward the solutions.
* * This article has been verified by a certified psychologist.
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